Cascadian Prophets

BC poet Fred Wah talks about his lecture The Simple, as well as the concept of serial poetry and his Music at the Heart of Thinking.

Larissa Lai joins Paul to talk about a host of topics from colonialism in contemporary China to the haibun form, the Tao Te Ching, and her new book, Iron Goddess of Mercy.

Interview with Robert Lashley on his book of poems Green River Valley

Open the anthology Women of the Beat Generation to page 256 and read the words of Brother Antoninus, William Everson, who said, "A series of women poets emerged in San Francisco who identified with the establish Beat Poets even as they challenged them on their grounds, including Joanne Kyger and Mary Norbert Körte. Of these, the career of Mary Norbert Körte most sharply defines the historic tension between the women of service and the women of passion. The strongest woman poet to emerge in the west, she became a student of Lew Welch, cracking convention within the bastion of the religious order." Raised in a devout family, joining the convent right out of high school in 1952, and stunned by 2 events in the tumultuous 1960s, Mary Norbert Körte continued to make striking poems deeply connected to the land where she lived in extreme southern Cascadia, in a town called Willets, California, until she passed away in 2022. To hear the original audio from this interview, click here. Check out more of what the Lab does here, and listen to more current and archival podcasts on Spotify or on our website. To get original poetry right in your mailbox this summer, check out the Poetry Postcard Fest.

On the Way to Kluusms is the first poetry chapbook to be published by Watershed Press, a bioregional press based in Seattle, but with strong connections to Vancouver Island. The author is Lorin Medley, whose poetry has been published in anthologies like Winter in America (Again, Cascadian Zen Volume II and Drift: Poems and Poets from the Comox Valley. Lorin lives, gardens and writes from her home in Comox, British Columbia, the unceded territory of the K’ómoks First Nation. She speaks about On the Way to Kluusms, what it means to live in place and how we disconnect from ourselves. Check out more of what the Lab does here, and listen to more current and archival podcasts on Spotify or on our website. If you liked Lorin's poetry, consider signing up for the Poetry Postcard Fest to have original poems sent right to your mailbox!

On November 10, 2012, Sam Hamill and Ian Boyden joined together to do an interview on Hamill's chapbook Border Songs, as well as Habitations, a collaboration between the poet, Sam, and the painter, Ian. Fewer than a dozen copies were made of the book, although in the interview Boyden recommends you forget whatever notions you hold about what a book is and can be. About 3 feet high and 10 inches wide, the cover made of fossilized maple, this book was the result of the organic collaboration between these two artists. Each page was a painting done by Boyden, using his typically atypical pigments and binders such as carbon, shark teeth, meteorites, and fresh water pearls, with the text of Hamill's poem etched into the painting by laser. In addition to the interview, at the Spring Street Center on the corner of 15th and Spring in Seattle's Cherry Hill neighborhood, Boyden spoke and took a Q&A about the collaboration and his methods, and Hamill gave a reading from his chapbook Border Songs, published by Word Palace Press.  (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4) Sam Hamill was the Founding Editor of Copper Canyon Press and author of more than forty volumes of poetry, essays, and celebrated translations from ancient Chinese, Japanese, Greek, Latin, and Estonian. Ian Boyden is an artist and writer currently working in the Blue Mountains southeast of Walla Walla, Washington. His practice in paintings and books, displays a fundamental drive to link the literary, material, and visual imagination. He makes his own paints and inks from unusual materials such as meteorites, shark teeth, and freshwater pearls. His work has been exhibited widely and is found in many public collections including Reed College, the Portland Art Museum, the Victoria & Albert Museum, and the Suzhou Museum. Website: https://ianboyden.com/ To hear the original audio, Hamill's reading, and Boyden's talk, see the archival post here. Check out more of what the Lab does here, and listen to more current and archival podcasts on Spotify or on our website.

In this edition of Cascadian Prophets, we hear Bill Barillas on Theodore Roethke. Bill Barillas is the editor of A Field Guide to the Poetry of Theodore Roethke and serves on the board of The Friends of Roethke Foundation. Check out more of what the Lab does here, and listen to more current and archival podcasts on Spotify or on our website.

In this interview with Thom Hartmann on the theft of human rights via corporate personhood and its history, he discussed the East India Company, the Boston Tea Party & an 1886 Supreme Court decision, Santa Clara vs. Southern Pacific that was twisted to give corporations human rights. He went on to illustrate its ramifications and solutions to the problem of corporations operating with rights designed for human beings. Thom Hartmann is an international relief worker, psychotherapist, father and author of over a dozen books, including the subject of this interview: Unequal Protection: The Rise of Corporate Dominance & the Theft of Human Rights. Original Airdate: October 20, 2002 To hear the original audio of this interview, click here. Check out more of what the Lab does here, and listen to more current and archival podcasts on Spotify or on our website.

You’d expect poetry to be part of an event inaugurating such a figure and that the poem offered for the occasion would be bland, written by a committee, or full of platitudes, but the poem delivered yesterday matched perfectly the tone of a campaign that appears to be built on mutual respect, vision, human rights and empathy.

If artists are the antennae of the race, then the poets and writers of British Columbia are onto something that the general populace may be ready to recognize and act on. That is the West Coast of the U.S. and that of Canada has more in common with each other than with the power centers back east, Ottawa and Washington, DC, New York City and Toronto. But some go a step further in recognizing a new culture emanating from what some call Cascadia. Trevor Carolan is one of them and if you believe the culture and literature of a nation is a critical component of any nation’s foundation, a new book he has edited begins to tell that story. Making Waves: Reading BC and Pacific Northwest Literature is that book and Trevor’s our guest. He teaches English and Creative Writing at the University of Fraser Valley and had published 14 books of poetry, translation, non-fiction, fiction and anthologies. Check out more of what the Lab does at https://cascadiapoeticslab.org/, and listen to more current and archival podcasts at https://cascadiapoeticslab.org/cascadian-prophets-podcast-2/.

"The first pew in the old time Black church is the Moaners' bench." - Gary Copeland Lilley Artificial intelligence and it's racist assumptions suggests "mourners' bench" as a clarification, but the moaners' bench refers to the audible expression of those in spiritual need due to grief, the blues, or simply the harshness of our time. Raven On The Moaners' Bench is the title of the latest collection of poetry from Gary Copeland Lilley. Originally from North Carolina, now living in Cascadia, Gary has published nine books of poetry, has work in several anthologies, is a graduate of the Warren Wilson College Creative Writing MFA program, is a Cave Canem Fellow and serves as Artistic Director of the Port Townsend Writers Conference. Check out more of what the Lab does at https://cascadiapoeticslab.org/, and listen to more current and archival podcasts at https://cascadiapoeticslab.org/cascadian-prophets-podcast-2/.

To preserve a bit of one's art is a true act of love, even if the book of stories it comes out of is titled Surrounded by Weasels: Stories from the Northwest of Ireland. The late Josie Gray is the story teller, and his widow Tess Gallagher, the world renowned poet, is the editor...

This interview is brought to you in memory of Jack Foley, who passed away earlier this month at the age of 85. The interview is with Jack and his wife Adelle, who were poets from Oakland, California.

In this interview on her book Vodou Visions with Sallie Ann Glassman, she discusses becoming a Manbo, or Vodou Priestess, Vodou, its history as a religion created by enslaved Africans, common misunderstandings about it...

Linda Russo is a poet, scholar, essay writer, willing  co-creator, collaborator and student of ecospheric care. Through the lens of ecofeminism, or geopoetics, or inspired by indigenous practices of interspecies kinship, her works explore relationality, with a more than human world alongside the complexities presented by fragmentation of land and human attention to place.

Hear a Salish perspective on wellness with Beaver Chief. Fred Beaver Chief Jamison was a spiritual leader who brought out the traditional teachings of the Northwest Coast (Native American) Salish people. He discussed his heritage, the songs and stories that are part of the Shaker Indian Doctor tradition, his collection of medicine songs on a C.D., and some of the differences between his culture and “settler” culture, such as concepts of land ownership.

What a great way to entice someone to read a book: "Like a prize-fighter boxing over his weight, Stephan Torre has long made his home in the wilderness, negotiating environments that are hostile...

On the morning of Wednesday, August 14, 2013, Habib and Paul Nelson awoke before 6A and were hiking with full packs up to “Jack’s Shack." But after an hour, maybe less, they knew they were not going to make it with those heavy packs.

The 9th Cascadia Poetry Festival is happening October 10-12th, 2025 at the Rainier Beach Community Club. One of the featured poets is Sharon Thesen, a legendary B.C. poet who considers herself a "Cascadian poet."

The latest and perhaps most complete translation of Han Shan has been done by Levitt in collaboration with Kazuaki Tanahashi and published by Shambhala Press.